《英语论文写作》是大学英语教材，从普通论文讲起，再到学术论文，初步培养学生从事学术研究、撰写学术文章的能力。全书用第一人称写成，充分体现了人文精神。

Part One An Overview of the Essay
I What Is an Essay
1 The Basic Structure of an Essay
2 Essays in Different Types of Writing
1) Narration and the narrative essay
2) Description and the descriptive essay
3) Exposition and the expository essay
4) Argumentation and the persuasive essay
II What Is a Research Paper
Part Two Writing an Essay
I Planning and Shaping the Essay
1 Choosing and Limiting a Topic
1) Choosing a topic
2) Limiting the topic
2 Determining Our Purpose and Audience
1) Determining our purpose and writing a statement of purpose
2) Identifying our audience and adjusting our tone
3 Gathering Material
4 Formulating a Thesis Statement
1) Elements of the thesis statement
2) Functions of the thesis statement
3) Advantages of an early thesis statement
4) Locations of the thesis statement
5) Some reminders when writing our thesis statement
5 Organizing and Outlining the Essay
1) Qualities of outline
2) Types of outline
3) Rules for writing an outline
Ⅱ Drafting the Essay
1 Writing the Introductory Paragraph
2 Writing the Concluding Paragraph
3 Gaining Unity and Coherence
4 Developing the Essay by Different Patterns of Organization
1) Developing the essay by process—and—analysis
2) Developing the essay by division-and-classification
3) Developing the essay by cause-and-effect
4) Developing the essay by comparison—and—contrast
5) Developing the essay by exemplification
6) Developing the essay by definition
5 Essay Checklist
Ⅲ Revising the Essay
1 Revising the Essay
1) Revising for content and organization
2) Revising for style
2 Editing the Essay
3 Dealing with the Final Draft
4 Proofreading
Part Three Writing a Research Paper
Ⅰ Learning About the Central Information System of
Modern Academic Library
Ⅱ Doing Prewriting Work
1 Choosing and Limiting a Topic
2 Doing Preliminary Reading
3 Writing a Preliminary Bibliography
4 Writing a Preliminary Outline and Thesis
5 Reading and Taking Notes
6 Revising the Outline and the Thesis
Ⅲ Writing the First Draft
Ⅳ Rewriting the Paper
1 Revising the Draft
2 Editing and Documenting the Paper
1) MLA style
2) APA style
3) CMS style
4) CBE style
3 Dealing with the Final Draft
4 Proofreading
Part Four Making Good Use of the Language
Ⅰ Striving for Clarity
Ⅱ Striving for Accuracy
Ⅲ Practicing Economy
1 Dropping Needless Repetition
2 Avoiding Needless Expansion
3 Removing Unnecessary Introducers
4 Cutting Down on Prepositions
5 Eliminating Dead Nouns
6 Omitting the Piling -ion Words
Ⅳ Gaining Appropriateness
1 Attending to Word Formality
2 Avoiding Overwritten Style
3 Avoiding Awkward Clichs
4 Avoiding Abuse of Euphemisms
Part Five Using Punctuation Marks Correctly
Ⅰ End Punctuation Marks
1 Period (.)
2 Question Mark (？)
3 Exclamation Point (!)
Ⅱ Internal Punctuation Marks
1 Comma (,)
2 Semicolon (;)
3 Colon (:)
4 Dash (--)
5 Virgule (/)
Ⅲ Enclosing Marks
1 Quotation Marks (“”) (‘’)
2 Parentheses （()）
3 Brackets ([])
Ⅳ Punctuation of Individual Words and of Terms
1 Apostrophe (')
2 Ellipsis Points (...)
3 Hyphen (-)
Two-Letter Abbreviations for US States
Proofreaders' Marks
Correction Symbols
Bibliography